Coinbase Expands Its Wings to Europe, Gets a Barclays Account and an E-Money License in U.K.

On Wednesday, March 14, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges Coinbase expanded in operations to the European continent and became the first crypto exchange to secure a bank account in U.K., with Barclays. This development is certainly expected to help British customers to get an easy access to Coinbase’s services and its products.

Apart from getting a bank account, the crypto-exchange has added another feather to its cap by securing an e-money license from UK’s financial regulator - Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). The rights given by the FCA will extend to 20 other countries in the European continent allowing the digital currency exchange to provide payment - and electronic money services as cash alternatives to its customers.

Due to the increased use of cryptocurrencies in illicit activities, British lenders have been distancing itself from cryptocurrencies and companies operating in this space. In an official blog post on Wednesday, Zeeshan Feroz, U.K. CEO at Coinbase, said: “We’ve been looking for accounts for over a year and have spoken to several banks. Barclays did a lot of due diligence on us as a business. We opened our doors and went through an open process with them.”

Coinbase said that in the last year, it business grew at double the rate in U.K compared to any other market in the world and it is currently on a hiring spree to meet the demand in U.K. It also announced that the company will soon start supporting institutional clients transactions through U.K.’s Faster Payments Scheme - a tool widely used by the traditional financial industry.

"U.K. customers will benefit from faster, safer and seamless bank transfers. We will start with a pilot, giving a small number of institutional users access to Faster Payments. In the coming weeks, we will begin rolling out to all U.K. customers, making the Coinbase experience increasingly easier,” said CEO Zeeshan Feroz.

As on date, Coinable has been using Estonian bank in order to process deposits and withdrawals from local customers. With the new license coming in place, customer’s fiat funds will be separated from Coinbase’s own funds and will be placed in different bank accounts.

CEO Zeeshan Feroz explained: “We are committed to making sure customer funds are always secure and this update means that our e-money operations have safeguards and operational standards at par with other regulated financial institutions. An example of this is segregation of client funds, where all customer fiat balances will be separated from Coinbase’s funds and kept in separate bank accounts.”